This weekend I had a taste of the night life here. Thursday there was an Erasmus party at the "discoteca" so some students organized a dinner beforehand and then afterwards we went to the club. Everyone else has gone out at night before and this was my first time since I live so far from the center of town and the last bus leaves the center at 9:30, which is when the party gets started. One of the exchange students from Greece invited me to stay the night at her apartment, which made it so much easier to go out and know that I didn't have to worry about getting home. (I think that being so far from town and from the university is something that I didn't think would bother me, but now I am not sure if I want to move or not...)
It was kinda weird eating Italian food in Spain (I guess it's also weird eating Italian food in the U.S. but I never really thought about it until now). We paid 10 € and got dinner and unlimited wine, beer or sangria :) Dinner was so much fun. Almost the entire restraunt was students from the university. More than half of the students there were from Spain, so it was nice to get to talk to Spanish students outside of class. They were all really nice and one of them invited a couple of us to Valencia where she lives to show us around next weekend. There were also exchange students; most of them were speaking in their native languages, but at my table we decided to speak only in Spanish so that we could all practice together. It was fun just drinking and eating and having a good time with people that share common interests.
After dinner we went to the club. So it was supposed to be a pajama party (if you wore pajamas you could get in for free). So I decided to wear mine. It was kinda awkward when only three of us showed up in our pjs, but we didn't care because we were having too much fun. We danced and had a good time. The only thing that was bad about the club was that here people can smoke in public areas so it was so hard to breathe. So since we couldn't breathe we decided to leave early. It turns out that leaving early here mean leaving at 4 in the morning. I now know that wearing heels is not the best idea for going out and having to walk back after dancing for three hours (next time I will take an extra pair of shoes with me).
I totally consider going to a club a cultural experience for me. It was interesting to see how things are both similar and different from when we go out in Iowa.
My next cultural experience was today when we took a trip to Morella. Morella is a city about an hour and a half outside of Castellon and it is considered by some to be one of the prettiest towns in Spain. The town is surrounded by a wall with six entry ways that centuries ago was used to keep out invaders. When I think of an old European town Morella is exactly what I picture. It has cute little shops and narrow streets.
We were given a tour of the town and go the see all of the touristy stuff: town hall, the church, the old convent and the church that was part of it, and finally we walked up to the top of the old castle. I consider myself a bit of a nerd and love to have tours of places and learn about old places and be the one right up from taking pictures as the tour guide tells us what everything is. Although it was a pretty town, it was so definitely cold today while we walked around, that was an experince in and of itself. It was cold but also think that it might have felt colder since it has been so warm the past couple of days and then it was cold weather all of a sudden.We were al shaking and frozen and were happy once we got to the restraunt for lunch. The food consisted of dishes typical to the town: olla de Morella (a lentel, chickpea and pork soup), stuffed pork and nata (pudding) for dessert (I knew that they ate pork in Spain, but I didn't realize how much they really do eat it here!), and of course wine (they also drink a lot of wine, which is really cheap here). During dessert people started singing songs from their countries and it was so much fun to hear all of these different songs in different languages. You could see when people sang that they had so much love for their homes and that they were proud to share that with everyone.
It was kinda weird eating Italian food in Spain (I guess it's also weird eating Italian food in the U.S. but I never really thought about it until now). We paid 10 € and got dinner and unlimited wine, beer or sangria :) Dinner was so much fun. Almost the entire restraunt was students from the university. More than half of the students there were from Spain, so it was nice to get to talk to Spanish students outside of class. They were all really nice and one of them invited a couple of us to Valencia where she lives to show us around next weekend. There were also exchange students; most of them were speaking in their native languages, but at my table we decided to speak only in Spanish so that we could all practice together. It was fun just drinking and eating and having a good time with people that share common interests.
After dinner we went to the club. So it was supposed to be a pajama party (if you wore pajamas you could get in for free). So I decided to wear mine. It was kinda awkward when only three of us showed up in our pjs, but we didn't care because we were having too much fun. We danced and had a good time. The only thing that was bad about the club was that here people can smoke in public areas so it was so hard to breathe. So since we couldn't breathe we decided to leave early. It turns out that leaving early here mean leaving at 4 in the morning. I now know that wearing heels is not the best idea for going out and having to walk back after dancing for three hours (next time I will take an extra pair of shoes with me).
I totally consider going to a club a cultural experience for me. It was interesting to see how things are both similar and different from when we go out in Iowa.
My next cultural experience was today when we took a trip to Morella. Morella is a city about an hour and a half outside of Castellon and it is considered by some to be one of the prettiest towns in Spain. The town is surrounded by a wall with six entry ways that centuries ago was used to keep out invaders. When I think of an old European town Morella is exactly what I picture. It has cute little shops and narrow streets.
We were given a tour of the town and go the see all of the touristy stuff: town hall, the church, the old convent and the church that was part of it, and finally we walked up to the top of the old castle. I consider myself a bit of a nerd and love to have tours of places and learn about old places and be the one right up from taking pictures as the tour guide tells us what everything is. Although it was a pretty town, it was so definitely cold today while we walked around, that was an experince in and of itself. It was cold but also think that it might have felt colder since it has been so warm the past couple of days and then it was cold weather all of a sudden.We were al shaking and frozen and were happy once we got to the restraunt for lunch. The food consisted of dishes typical to the town: olla de Morella (a lentel, chickpea and pork soup), stuffed pork and nata (pudding) for dessert (I knew that they ate pork in Spain, but I didn't realize how much they really do eat it here!), and of course wine (they also drink a lot of wine, which is really cheap here). During dessert people started singing songs from their countries and it was so much fun to hear all of these different songs in different languages. You could see when people sang that they had so much love for their homes and that they were proud to share that with everyone.I have learned more about Spain during the past two weeks, especially the past couple of days, than I have learned in years of studying about it. It makes such a difference to study about a country when you are actually there and can see first hand what things are and what the customs of a people are. Even though my encounters have been brief in comparisson to what they willl be, I have taken so much from them. And I love that I am experiencing them with people that are going through the same things that I'm going through. Everyday is a mini adventure and I love waking up ready to see what the day will present.
Informative content, In bachelor party you can drink all night but between the beer and the strippers, wouldn't it be fun to have a few bachelor party games such as Despedida Soltero.
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